Quote Originally Posted by phasemancer View Post
One thing that I've found is that staring at certain types of textures, without moving my eyes and blinking as little as I can, seems to make the texture amenable to change more into what I think I see, or what I think about, rather than what I see. Tree bark is one example. Even just staring at this image on my computer works, although it may work better with a real 3d object than just an image http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi..._guatemala.JPG

Mylynes, does the technique work best for you if you don't move your eyes, or did it use to until you became better at it?
Now it doesn't matter, but I think back in the beginning I did tend to avoid too much eye movement. It seems as if when your eyes move, the images tend to usually move with your eyes.

Quote Originally Posted by StephL View Post
Very interesting.
By the way - pressing on your eyeballs will give a "wrong but strong" stimulus - there is a term in German - too lazy now to look it up.
Right, I think I may have mentioned in the first post that this may be used to get a feel for things and initially be able to see the "canvas" but the idea is to be able to control these hallucinations/illusions without needing to put pressure on the eyes. And I am not sure at all but it seems like putting pressure on your eyes regularly may be bad for them.
Basically - the receptors for light get activated by the pressure directly - so it is "real seeing" what you get.
It is known, that our brain "censors" vision anyway.
For example - the blood vessels for your retina are actually between the light-influx per pupil and the actual receptors for anatomical reasons.
What this means, is that you have a constant shadow over your vision, where these vessels are covering up.
Now - usually you have two eyes open - so the real info is available to you - per computation of the differences of light detection.
The blanks get filled in by real light from the other eye.
But if you close one - you still do not see this "spider" of vessels. This time it is pure filling in of blanks from your brain.
Basically - a hallucination.
You can show this very nicely - and I have had this experience - when somebody looks at your background of the eye with a looking device, which sends out a lot of light, besides optical arrangements for the physician to see something.
That is actually one of the ways I used to practice when I was attempting to gain more control even in brighter areas. I would close one eye and leave the other open.

Now comes the interesting part - once somebody only just learns this, she will not be good at only going through the pupil with her light.
Then this light does also shine through your iris - and - tata - you suddenly see these vessels - like a projection - hanging a bit of a distance outside of you.
This is what you always see - just the shadow now is not where it always is - the light falls in in an unusual angle - this is new - and there you have it - you see it.

There are many such mechanisms in place - to help us along, so to speak.
But they also can be manipulated consciously to a certain degree.
So - voluntary day-time-hallucinations should be possible, purely scientifically speaking.

But I wonder - are you always sure what is what?
Do you have a "only pure reality NOW" switch, or is there a sort of a constant incertitude about what you perceive, and itīs actual physical correlates?
In the initial post I believe I posted a warning on this. It actually did cause me many problems in my early childhood which led me to want to gain more and more control. If you practice this technique long enough and get good with it, you will be opening a door. If you can create these hallucinations consciously then you can also create them subconsciously. This could could potentially develope into something like full blown schizophrenia, or at least something that could be diagnosed as schizophrenia by a shrink. On the plus side, as your control gets better, any uncontrolled hallucinations may be removed/edited into something more pleasant. On the down side, you may not always be able to tell the difference between what is real and what isn't, though for the most part it is usually easy to tell the difference.

Funny by the way - I did practise that as a child - almost like you say - starting in the dark and with pressing my eyes sometimes, too.
And yes - in semi-dark rooms, I was able to concentrate so much, that I could get to see something.
But not in broad daylight.
What I remember was a wolf and a wild pig - why ever I did these - donīt know (technically illusions not hallucinations*).
But I got pretty afraid of really having created that wolf and it showing up against my will. But it didnīt.
Sounds like a good method to get dream-control and per the senses.


But a bit too extreme maybe.
I imagine such an ability might bother me with too much sliding and slipping of the borders of imagination and reality.
Rather staying with visualization for now.
Were you regretting to be proficient in this from time to time, Mylynes?
Only in the beginning, and that was when I was less proficient. I had some control but enough that it opened a door and let some nasty things through, overtime I overcame this through more control. The midway point may be a bit scary, but in my opinion it was definitely worth it to get to where I am now.
*
By the way - maybe this interests someone - terminology:
A hallucination is something created/perceived "in thin air" - like a dragon appearing in the air above you with no planes in the sky or the like, while an illusion is defined as perceiving something real - like a stool - but transforming it in your mind into a small dragon for example, which may get bigger and fly - what it is called then - donīt know - maybe transformation from illusion to hallucination..?
Illusions being "easier" of course - or more common, when you read about peopleīs experiences with hallucinogens - you find descriptions of illusions which are incorrectly termed hallucinations in common language.



Oh yeah - and edit - when describing this "vision" of my own eye background vessels to a professor of ophthalmology - he got really excited and explained all this to us - finding the topic fascinating himself.
We had thought, that I had seen herīs - by some two way functioning of the device.


Quote Originally Posted by WakingNomad View Post
I have seen the blood vessels in my eyes when I hit my head on a concrete ceiling jumping down some stairs, just for a split second. That was weird. It was like kind of watery-looking clear shapes of my blood vessels as soon as I hit my head.

***

On another note, I have been practicing this technique more. I have been able to see a type of grid with my eyes open that I see sometimes, and usually make go away because it used to make me feel like I was crazy. It's more like an overlay which may or may not be a grid. The last time the overlay was kind of red and amorphous. I hope to turn this into a Heads Up Display in my waking life eventually.
I have been having a hard time trying to relax and practice because my cat keeps walking on me when I lie down.
HUDs are fun. Both while dreaming and awake.